Bay Area Beats

When you walk into the dimly lit Royal Cuckoo Organ Lounge on Mission Street, you might hear the familiar voice of a man serenading the dive bar’s mostly millennial crowd. It’s soul singer Freddie Hughes, a veteran of the Bay Area music scene for more than six decades and the vocalist on several hit records from the 1960s. In this edition of Bay Area Beats, Freddie shares his story. 

Carly Bond is a songwriter and guitar player. Her band, Meernaa, released their first full-length record this summer titled Heart Hunger. She began writing songs for it after she discovered a family secret. Through processing her family’s history, she’s crafted a synth-driven, dreamy landscape.

In this edition of Bay Area Beats, original band member David Bustamante tells the story of Dakila's return to the stage after 40 years.

Oakland singer-songwriter Zakiya Harris performs under the name Sh8peshifter. She came to that name and her musical career when her personal and professional life fell apart.

In this edition of Bay Area Beats, Enon talks about the rush and raw energy in combining hip-hop and punk.

After winning a music competition in 2015, Oakland hip-hop artist Enon Gaines wanted to create a band that could match his energy. He met with musicians with different musical backgrounds and founded the group Unlikely Heroes. They mix hip-hop bars with punk melodies and riffs. 

From the series Uncuffed:

Throughout his troubled life, the guitar has been Joseph Kaufman’s constant companion. When he landed in prison, he discovered what he needed to change was with him the entire time.

This summer marks the 20th anniversary of Supernatural- Santana’s wildly successful, Grammy-winning 1999 album, which has become one of the best-selling albums of all-time.  One of the singers on that album was Tony Lindsay, Santana’s lead vocalist from the early ’90s to 2015. In this edition of Bay Area Beats, Tony shares what it means to be a part of the Santana legacy and why he doesn’t plan on retiring any time soon.

From the series Uncuffed:

Maimon Pony’s career as a pianist was cut short by drug addiction. In Solano State Prison, he keeps practicing and waits for his release.

Lydia Pense is the lead singer of the San Francisco soul band Cold Blood. They were one of the first acts signed to legendary San Francisco promoter Bill Graham's “Fillmore  Records." In this edition of Bay Area Beats, Pense sat down to share some stories from her long and illustrious career.

In this edition of Bay Area Beats Brittany Tanner, Felicia Gangloff-Bailey, Lauren Adams, and, Karega Bailey of SOL (Source of Light) Development explain using their music as a form of activism and healing.

In this edition of Bay Area Beats, Alexi Rose Belchere and Devin Nelson from the Y Axes talk about using science fiction to express emotional concepts and how San Francisco ties into their music.

This Friday, filmmaker Jordan Peele’s highly anticipated new horror movie “Us” is being released in theatres. The film’s trailer has gotten a lot of attention, especially here in the Bay Area for featuring the song “I Got 5 on It,” which was a hit in the mid-90s for the Oakland rap group The Luniz.

This weekend, a capella music lovers will be gathering in Berkeley for the WeSing Vocal Festival. The three-day event was started by Oakland singer Lisa Forkish who got involved in the a capella music scene during her college years. Her group at that time was the inspiration for the hit film “Pitch Perfect.”

Ruby Mountain is an eclectic singer-songwriter and producer from Oakland. She grew up performing traditional Afghan songs with her father while also experiencing all of the Soul, R&B and Hip Hop that the Bay Area had to offer. 

If Freddie Mercury & David Bowie had a star child her name would be Kat Robichaud. She is an over-the-top, theatrical rocker whose career got a boost when she participated on the TV hit “The Voice.”

San Francisco’s Tommy Guerrero started his career as a professional skateboarder in the 1980s as a member of the legendary Bones Brigade Crew. They were made up of mostly teenagers who introduced a new generation to skateboarding through their recorded highlight videos. It was during those years touring the world that Tommy also pursued his other passion — music.

When she was a child, Stephanie Louis developed a strong connection to the harp after watching a performance on I Love Lucy. But it took decades for her to change her career, city, and even her name to fulfill her passion: music. Today, audiences know her as Destiny Muhammad, the 'Harpist from the Hood'.

While studying classical voice at San Francisco's public arts high-school, Jamie Zee felt drawn to jazz music. The genre’s non conformist ethos seemed to mirror Zee’s experience as a half white, half Chinese, bisexual and non binary person.

Rooted in Mexican oral tradition, Chhoti Maa raps, sings, and writes about migration, queerness, and indigenous spirituality. The Oakland based artist talks about her latest album, "Caldo de Hueso," meaning bone broth.

In this edition of Bay Area Beats, San Francisco singer Kim Nalley explains how balancing singing with being a historian and Ph.D student has helped her pay tribute to the legends of jazz that have come before her.

San Francisco based singer-songwriter Anna Hillburg has played in countless bands over the past 20 years. In 2013, she released her first solo record and recalls it being a more vibrant time for the San Francisco art community.

Songwriting can be a challenge. So when San Francisco musician Karl Digerness found himself battling writer’s block he started reading the texts from plays written by William Shakespeare for some lyrical inspiration.

San Francisco based singer, producer, and composer, Aish came on to the Bay Area music scene this year with the release of his debut album Mother. Combining classical chamber and contemporary electronic music, the record tells the story of Aish’s estranged relationship with his family and details his journey to San Francisco from India seventeen years ago. 

When musician Olivia Lee started her electronic dream pop project, There’s Talk, she wasn’t making music that she thought would ever be released. In this edition of Bay Area Beats, Olivia explains how her childhood love for electronic synthesizers started it all.

This year’s San Francisco Arts Commission Legacy Grant award recipient, Patrick Makuakāne began his journey with Hula dancing as a teenager while growing up in Honolulu, Hawaii. After moving to San Francisco in the eighties, Patrick founded Nā Lei Hulu I Ka Wēkiu, an award-winning Hula Dance Company and school in the city where he’s been the Artistic Director for the past 33 years.

Gilberto Rodriguez y Los Intocables is an eclectic Chicano band that can’t quite be defined by one genre. That’s why they call themselves “Los Intocables” or The Untouchables, a sound defying borders and labels.

2019 will mark the 40th Anniversary for jazz fusion band Hiroshima. The band started in the late seventies when leader Dan Kuramoto found music as a way to honor his Japanese-American heritage. Creating a signature sound that blended jazz and funk with traditional Japanese instruments; Hiroshima went from being a garage band to becoming one of the first Asian-American groups to get steady airplay on mainstream urban radio. In this edition of Bay Area Beats Dan discusses four decades of Hiroshima.

In 1991 Rapper Del the Funky Homosapien became the first member of Oakland’s Hieroglyphics hip-hop collective be introduced to the world with his debut album “I Wish My Brother George Was Here.” For Del, music has always been a family affair.

A young musician in Oakland is making waves in the Muslim community: Alia Sharrief. She’s part of a new generation of Muslim hip hop artists following in the footsteps of people like Yasiin Bey, best known by his stagename, MosDef, Lupe Fiasco, Qtip, Ali Shaheed Mohamed, the list goes on.

For the past 25 years, Oakland’s Hieroglyphics crew has been a staple in the Bay Area underground hip hop scene. As one of the founding members of Oakland’s Hieroglyphics, Tajai Massey and his group Souls of Mischief became household names with their classic hit "‘93 til Infinity". In this edition of Bay Area Beats Tajai talks about juggling his careers in music and architecture as well as the importance of the Hiero Day Festival which has quickly become an Oakland tradition.